


nearly didn't notice (the gentlest feeling)

by alpacas



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-05
Updated: 2020-02-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:27:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22567804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alpacas/pseuds/alpacas
Summary: The thing is, it’s gonna happen. Amanda knows it, has known it for a while — just known, deep in her heart, the inevitability of it all. She’s gonna fall in love with Carisi. One day, she’s gonna turn around and they’ll be married and living on the island with a house and a picket fence and a dog and two kids, and the problem is she’s already got Franny and the girls.And the problem is that Amanda doesn’t like the wordinevitable. Not at all.
Relationships: Dominick "Sonny" Carisi Jr./Amanda Rollins
Comments: 13
Kudos: 141





	nearly didn't notice (the gentlest feeling)

**Author's Note:**

> title from 'blue light' by bloc party —
> 
> _If that's the way it is  
>  Then that's the way it is  
> I still feel you and the taste of cigarettes  
> What could I ever run to  
> Just tell me it's tearing you apart  
> Just tell me you cannot sleep  
> And you didn't even notice  
> When the sky turned blue  
> And you couldn't tell the difference  
> Between me and you_
> 
> _And I nearly didn't notice  
>  The gentlest feeling_

The thing is —

The thing is, it’s gonna happen. Amanda knows it, has known it for a while — just _known_ , deep in her heart, the inevitability of it all. She’s gonna fall in love with Carisi. One day, she’s gonna turn around and they’ll be married and living on the island with a house and a picket fence and a dog and two kids, and the problem is she’s already got Franny and the girls.

And the problem is that Amanda doesn’t like the word _inevitable_. Not at all.

Inevitable means marrying too young and a husband that walks out on you. Inevitable is two part-time jobs in a small town, knowing everyone, drowning slow. The backseat of a truck on prom night, a dress from WalMart or dress barn, driving in circles, collecting food stamps. Inevitable means not taking that psych class, that computer science class, getting a badge, making detective, moving to New York.

She knows it. She knows.

But it sneaks up on her. Comfortable does that. Slips up when you’re not looking and strangles you with warm arms.

He’s over for dinner. Used to happen a lot. Too often, but she’d liked the company. Needed it, too, with a baby and a dog and an over-extended sitter. Hasn’t happened much since she got pregnant again, since he made ADA after that. Since — oh. Since the one time she saw him trying to get up the nerve to kiss her. Since Al. Since the way he’d left the delivery room, shoulders slumped, all kicked puppy, and with Al holding her hand through a contraction she’d still wanted to beg him to stay.

“I’ve stirred it enough,” she’s saying, her arm sore.

“No such thing. You gotta stir it nonstop, at _least_ five minutes,” he leans over her, his front brushing against her back. She swats at him with the spoon, missing on purpose. He ducks away, grinning.

“I’ve made grits before.”

“This isn’t grits, it’s polenta.”

“Same difference. They’re stirred. C’mon.”

“When I was bad on a Sunday, my mom used’ta make me stand on a chair and stir for half an hour, easy. You gotta keep stirring or they clump up.”

“I’m telling you, they’re stirred.”

“You wanna know how to cook or not?”

“Hooo, don’t you start with me. Go watch TV with the other kids.”

“I’m just sayin’. You wanna learn how to cook?”

He’s grinning down at her and the pot of polenta, which is settling and sticking without her to stir it. Amanda turns from the stove, the pan of sauce he made and set to simmer. Over behind him, Jesse is sitting on the couch, watching cartoons. Billie in her bouncy seat, Frannie protecting her from nearby.

There’s a world where she kisses him now.

A world where it’s normal as can be, where their bickering always ends this way, where Amanda never takes a Sunday shift and Carisi saves his paperwork for later and they argue over making dinner. Eat on the couch with the girls, and then talk out their cases when they’ve been put to bed. She takes the girls to see him at court. He texts her grocery lists all hours of the day. They talk about finding a bigger place, but argue about size and location: he wants to move them out to the island, same neighborhood as his family. White picket fence. She wants to stay in the city. One’s too expensive, one’s too familiar, but they both like the bickering.

There’s a world where she kisses him for the first time. Grabs him right here in the kitchen, right now while he’s grinning down at her — seeing the dopey look in his eyes, and knowing what it means. She means to be decisive but hesitates, a hand on his lapel — he hesitates, too polite to try for anything. She’s never really been with a guy like that before. Watches him swallow, his adam’s apple bob. Touches his face and pulls him down, right there in the kitchen, the spoon between them, staining both their shirts with polenta. He’d hesitate even then, she thinks: but he wants her and she knows it and she wants to feel it, his stupid over-eager enthusiasm, clumsy and needy. Jesse would interrupt them, shrieking _eww!_ or _gross!_ and they’d part embarrassed, both flushed and looking away — pretending it never happened — and maybe Amanda would be happy with that, be okay with that, okay with the memory and the knowledge of it. And maybe after dinner she’d ask him if he wanted to stay over, casual, like it means nothing much, knowing it means everything there is.

“Go watch TV,” she says again, smiling, clutching the spoon a little tighter.

He looks at her. He looks away. “Sure you can handle it?”

“Which one of us still has a gun?”

He chuckles. Ambles over to the sofa, squishes in next to Jesse to make her laugh and squirm. Her heart goes tight and hot, watching them.

It’s funny. Al’s great with Billie, great with Jesse, and he doesn’t have to be and she’s grateful as hell for it. But that tight hot feeling —

Well. She knows what it is. She’s a fool but she’s not stupid.

He holds onto her in the elevator and she cries and shakes and clutches onto him. It seems to last forever: a great cut in her, draining and loosening and pouring out nothing but pus and bile. He holds her and strokes her hair and his chin and jaw bump against her head.

The elevator doors slide open, and he takes her by the hand, pulls her out. She doesn’t wanna, wants to hit the stop button and just stay there, stay in that box, just him and her — suddenly caught and exposed, the shame of her red face, the tears, the guys waiting to get into the elevator — guys she knows, works with, who know her and know she doesn’t break down like some victim or idiot —

“It’s fine, nothing to see, come on,” Carisi is saying, pushing them past the three or four cops waiting to go up. Pulls them into the little hall by the storage closet on this floor; the handicapped bathroom that’s been out of order for like a week. “You okay?”

He clutches her shoulders like she’s a kid.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I don’t know what came over me, I’m —“ She does know, and so does he. But the storm’s passed, and she closes her eyes. “I just wanna go home.”

“Okay. Okay. I’ll get you home. Come on, you’re okay.” He chuffs her shoulder the way he probably does his sisters. Might’ve been nice to have a big brother, growing up. Someone to protect you and look out for you. She can’t imagine. That feeling, that idea. Someone there to say: it’s okay. That’s my job. I’ll look out for you. But it isn’t, of course. You gotta be able to take care of yourself.

He gets them a Lyft, one of the fancy towncar ones that’s silent and dark. It takes them about an hour to get across town, and they sit on opposite sides of the bench. She looks out her window, her forehead on the glass. He shifts around a lot. She can smell his soap or aftershave on her, Irish Springs or something, too cheap for an ADA — but it’s comforting, weirdly. Makes her think of him saying _I got you_ , the fleeting moment his lips had touched the crown of her head. An accident, probably. She doesn’t know.

They get to her place, and he starts on dinner as she hugs her babies. He brings them pasta while they’re all cuddling on her bed, and he grins sadly and looks ready to say goodbye until she invites him to join them, right there in her room. Jesse’s thrilled by the ‘picnic’ and he sits at the foot of the bed, smiling crinkly and eating spaghetti.

She gives her girls baths and reads them to sleep as he does the dishes, and she falls asleep before she can tell him goodbye.

She wakes up in the middle of the night, Jesse heavy and breathing wet against her cheek, Billie sleeping soundly in her arms. Amanda needs to pee, and she frees herself from her babies as careful as she can. Pees and then goes to the living room to find Carisi sleeping on the couch in his shirt and dress pants and socks, his jacket and tie draped over a chair.

She watches him snore for a couple of seconds. The lines on his face she doesn’t usually notice. His hair all mussed, coming free of all his gel. The weirdness of it. Carisi sleeping in her living room.

She pads over and shakes him awake. He’s up in a flash. “Hey. Sorry,” she whispers.

“No… no, it’s okay.” His voice heavy with sleep, but he blinks himself awake fast enough, sits up and grasps for her arm. “Hey. You okay? You doing alright?”

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah. I’m feelin’ a lot better.”

“Good. Good.”

“Thanks. I mean, thanks for everything. For letting me just — you know.”

“No — it’s no problem. You — you went through a lot, you coulda been killed.”

“I’m okay.”

“I know. I just mean — I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Thanks to you.”

He’s looking up at her. Seems to only just realize he’s got his hand on her arm, and pulls it away. Careful. Like she’ll notice if he moves too quick.

The apartment is silent. Even the fridge isn’t running. The traffic outside is muffled and slow, and the air is dark and heavy and still. It’s neither warm or cold, and the darkness softens their voices and faces.

She kisses him.

Brief and soft.

His lips are chapped and he doesn’t kiss back. But his eyes close. “Rollins…” Beseeching. Warning. Asking.

“It’s okay.” She tucks her hair behind her ear. She kisses him again.

He kisses back this time. Pushes up to meet her, his palm scraping against her cheek, into her hair. He inhales sharply and she makes a sound, not a moan or a cry but a gasp of relief and of pain and exhalation, and he leans into her and cups her face in his hands with desperation, with —

I thought you were gonna die, he murmurs, I thought I was gonna — y’had me so worried, you don’t know —

It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m okay now, I’ve got what I needed, I’m okay, I just —

Pushing and consuming and aching and overwhelming. The relief of it. The ache of it. Finally. Finally. At last. At last.

_You seemed nice. And I don’t do that. I don’t do nice._

That’s one world.

In another world:

Amanda wakes up in the morning, with her girls tucked around her and Frannie at the foot of the bed. She’s exhausted and her neck is cramped up and she smells dirty diaper and grins sleepily up at the ceiling.

Gets the girls up and dressed and fed and checks her phone: Liv checking up and clearing her for leave, Fin checking up and inviting her out when she’s up for it. A long text from Carisi, who writes like he talks: too much.

> Hey Rollins
> 
> Just checked up on you and the girls and you’re all sound asleep and looking pretty cute. I filled up Frannie’s bowl and took her for a quick walk so she should be ok until morning. Let myself out. It’s about 9. You don’t owe me anything don’t worry but if you want to make it up to me you know my coffee order haha
> 
> I’ll see you later text me when you can.
> 
> Say hey to the girls for me!

A ten minute delay, and a final text:

> I’m really glad you’re okay.

She texts him back first. Sends him a couple of photos of the girls and the spaghetti stains on her bedspread. Venmos him twenty bucks for coffee and lyft and spends the morning playing cash tag as he keeps trying to send it back.

Inevitable.

But not yet.


End file.
